Postal cover: Butterfield Overland Mail Centennial 1858-1958 | Newhall, California, Participates.
Front: Postmarked Newhall, Calif., Oct. 8, 1958, 9:30 a.m. Addressed (by rubber stamp) to M.M. Smoll of Michigan, a philatelist.
Back: Postmarked San Francisco 11, Oct. 10, 1958, with a remider to use Zone numbers for better mail service (like the "11" in San Francisco 11).
About the Centennial Celebration (and Newhall's Participation):
Click to enlarge.
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Butterfield Stage Caravan Due Today
Los Angeles Times | Tuesday, October 7, 1958
The Butterfield Overland Mail stage will arrive in Los Angeles today — exactly 100 years after it made its first stop here.
Only this time it will bring almost 200,000 pieces of mail — instead of the few hundred pieces it carried in 1858.
The stage, though following the original schedule of the first transcontinental overland mail run, will, of course, be mechanized.
Modern Trailer Used
Even its two-horse team will be borne on a modern truck-trailer.
With it will come one of the original blacksmith shops and anvil units owned by the old Butterfield stage [typesetting error] — a pickup truck; plus the first U.S. highway post office — a bus; a mobile chapel, a sound car, a chuckwagon on wheels, and several station wagons bearing officials of the caravan which left Missouri Sept. 16.
The caravan crossed the Colorado River into California at old Ft. Yuma, Ariz., yesterday morning and spent last night at Warner's Hot Springs, one of the original stage stops.
The mail it carries came from stamp collectors seeking the special commemorative cachet which will be returned to them from San Francisco next Friday along with special 4-cent commemorative stamps marking the centennial.
ITINERARY
(From L.A. Times, Oct. 3, 1958)
The itinerary includes 198 post office stops for pickup of special centennial caravan mail. Points in Southern California will include:
Monday — Winterhaven, Calexico, Heber, El Centro, Seelye, Plaster city, Vallecito, Julian and Warner Springs.
Tuesday — Oak Grove, Aguanga, Temecula, Murrieta, Elsinore, Alberhill, Temescal, Corona, Chino, Pomona, Walnut, El Monte and Los Angeles.
Wednesday — San Fernando, Newhall, Saugus, Castaic, Gorman, Lebec, Tejon, Grapevine, Lamont, Bakersfield, Ducor, Terra Bella and Porterville.
Thursday — Strathmore, Lindsay, Visalia, Goshen, Travers, Kingsburg, Selma, Fowler, Fresno, Mendota, Firebaugh and on to San Jose.
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Stage Stops Today
[Typesetting error; s/b The caravan will make the] following stops today: Oak Grove, 8 a.m.; Aguanga, 8:30 a.m.; Temecula, 0:15 a.m.; Murrieta, 9:25 a.m.; Elsinore, 9:50 a.m.; Alberhill, 10:15 a.m.; Corona, 10:35 a.m.; Chino, 11:15 a.m.; Pomona, 11:35 a.m.; Walnut, noon.
At 12:20 the caravan will pull into El Monte, " the end of the Santa Fe Trail" for lunch, leaving again at 1:30p.m. for the Terminal Annex Post Office parking lot at Macy and Alameda Sts.
There it will stay until tomorrow morning when it takes off for San Fernando, Newhall, Saugus and points north, spending tomorrow night at Porterville, en route to San Francisco.
Public Open House
Public open house will be held at Terminal Annex lot from 7 to 9 o'clock tonight, with a program headed by Postmaster Otto K. Oleson and featuring Dr. Gustave O. Arit, president of the Historical Society of Southern California; Charles W. Childs of Rochester, N.Y., great-grandson of John Butterfield, the stage line's founder; Roscoe Conkling, author of "The Butterfield Overland Mail," and Cowboy Actor Monty Montana [sic, s/b Montie].